Back in the Game

[Mark_C]

Holy mini-oceans Batman!
That looks like its going to make an incredible reef.
Let me know if you need anything. I'm up the road in Brick.

 

[diana a]

Diana,

I was going to order the overnight 15lbs of live rock for KP aquatics to help with the cycle and biodiversity. I know you said you had ordered some previously. Did you get any good life on the rocks and about how many pieces came with it? size of pieces?

Sorry for the late reply. I didn't see this until now.

I got a great rocks that have life in them. I got the 15 LB package that was shipped in water and to my house. I wanted to add diversity to my tank. Would I order again...Yes! I wish I had gotten more and replaced the rocks that I have before the order...that is how much I love the rocks. It came with 3 clams, star fish, coralline algae, orange sponges, brittle starfish, and three small Porites. 5 rocks. Approx 7 to 10 inches

I quarantined the rocks for 4 weeks. These were found by day 3...epitoke and bobbit. The only pests. I elevated the rocks so I would see anything I didn't want

 

[Mike S]

Just a heads up KP seems to be sold out of their rock at the moment and has a signup for a waitlist.

 

[diana a]

Just a heads up KP seems to be sold out of their rock at the moment and has a signup for a waitlist.

When I ordered back in Jan, I was on a waitlist because they were out of rocks. Weather keeps them from diving. Waiting list only lasted 2 weeks.

 

[john90009]

I remember the good old days when fish stores would get weekly shipments of the good stuff. Ain’t nothing like the real stuff!! I just wish they werent big boulders, I wish tonga branch was cheap and came looking like that like it used to.

 

[diana a]

I remember always checking Tropiquarium's live rock weekly shipment. They use to have a tank just for tonga for sale.

 

[john90009]

Yessss!!! Even the dry rock bin would have a few random nice shapes. The two red sea tanks they had looked so nice and natural with actual macro growing in with the corals. The tank looked so pristine and the rock work was phenomenal.

 

[DangerDave]

That’s cool. Any idea yet what the porites look like under reef lighting?

 

[Shawn2122]

What's up everybody. I have some updates and my first troubleshoot that I need your help with. I aquascaped my rock and went for the three separate islands look. I am pretty happy with it as it has some big caves for big fish and smaller ones for the little guys. I attached the pics below.
Now the troubleshoot. I went to start filling it up to do my leak test this weekend with my RODI unit tonight and I ran into two problems.
Background: My RODI unit is from my old tank 10 years ago but I replaced all the cartridges and RO membrane. I even replaced the quick connect tubing right where the water first comes into the unit as it was leaking.
Problem one: I just replaced the first connect and it is still leaking at the quick connect[brand new]. It looks like the pressure is pushing against the quick connect and creating a small gap. Any thoughts?
Problem two: the unit is hooked up to my outside hose. My TDS meter shows that after 3 micron filters it enters the membrane at 144ppm. It comes out of the membrane at 2ppm[sounds great], but it then travels through 3 different DI resin cartridges and leaves the unit at 2ppm. So my question is, is that normal as I thought it should come out of the unit at 0ppm?
Looking forward to your advice.

 

[myrjon]

As for the leaking>If you changed the connectors,Try using a stiffer ro line. Some of these seem to be different o.s diameter..... As for the tds do you have the lines going the right way?Are the filters set up correct order> Do you have a line restrictor in the output line>

 

[amado]

What's up everybody. I have some updates and my first troubleshoot that I need your help with. I aquascaped my rock and went for the three separate islands look. I am pretty happy with it as it has some big caves for big fish and smaller ones for the little guys. I attached the pics below.
Now the troubleshoot. I went to start filling it up to do my leak test this weekend with my RODI unit tonight and I ran into two problems.
Background: My RODI unit is from my old tank 10 years ago but I replaced all the cartridges and RO membrane. I even replaced the quick connect tubing right where the water first comes into the unit as it was leaking.
Problem one: I just replaced the first connect and it is still leaking at the quick connect[brand new]. It looks like the pressure is pushing against the quick connect and creating a small gap. Any thoughts?
Problem two: the unit is hooked up to my outside hose. My TDS meter shows that after 3 micron filters it enters the membrane at 144ppm. It comes out of the membrane at 2ppm[sounds great], but it then travels through 3 different DI resin cartridges and leaves the unit at 2ppm. So my question is, is that normal as I thought it should come out of the unit at 0ppm?
Looking forward to your advice.

If you have a flush valve on the RODi I would flush it until it reads zero. If you changed the carbon it sometimes has crap in it.

 

[Shawn2122]

OK, I will try and use a different tube that seems to be stiffer[It just looks like the pressure is pushing the fitting out further than normal]. All of the cartridges are brand new. It goes sediment prefilter, 2 separate micron filters[5 then 1], RO membrane, and then 3 different resin chambers[cation-anion-pro mixed]. I do have a flush valve and will try and let it run for a little but. Is it typical for the resins to not remove any more of the TDS after the membrane?
FYI - I used the BRS 7 part replacement pack.
I also have a restrictor that keeps the pressure around 62-65

 

[amado]

OK, I will try and use a different tube that seems to be stiffer[It just looks like the pressure is pushing the fitting out further than normal]. All of the cartridges are brand new. It goes sediment prefilter, 2 separate micron filters[5 then 1], RO membrane, and then 3 different resin chambers[cation-anion-pro mixed]. I do have a flush valve and will try and let it run for a little but. Is it typical for the resins to not remove any more of the TDS after the membrane?
FYI - I used the BRS 7 part replacement pack.
I also have a restrictor that keeps the pressure around 62-65

I have the same one. I flush everything before I make a new batch of water. I also use the mixed
Resin on each of the 3 banks instead of separating them. I personally didn’t see any difference in using
The separated resin.

 

[Shawn2122]

As for the leaking>If you changed the connectors,Try using a stiffer ro line. Some of these seem to be different o.s diameter..... As for the tds do you have the lines going the right way?Are the filters set up correct order> Do you have a line restrictor in the output line>

I used the stiffer RO line and it worked-Thanks!!!

 

[Shawn2122]

Well, the plumbing is done, the lights are hung and the tank is officially cycled. I guess I am a reefer now. Special thanks to @mnat and @NikkiT for the macroalgae hook-up. Couldn't figure out how to get the blue out of the pic[it is not nearly that blue in real life].

 

[mickeysreef <*))))<]

Well, the plumbing is done, the lights are hung and the tank is officially cycled. I guess I am a reefer now. Special thanks to @mnat and @NikkiT for the macroalgae hook-up. Couldn't figure out how to get the blue out of the pic[it is not nearly that blue in real life].

pro mode in samsung phone is pretty good to get the blue out, change the settings to make it like orange or just google best settings for reef pictures. idk about apple?

 

[john90009]

Photography with leds is an art within itself. An orange filter for the phone helps and then tweaking the light settings around can get you what they look like to your human eye. For my tank runs the ab schedual as most other people I find that turning the blues up to 100, dropping the red and greens to zero and put the white led at 10 percent, shooting through an orange filter, or even a yellow filter I can get colors identical to the human eye. It takes a lot of tweaking, and obviously everyone’s eyes are different.